David Leite's Blog, page 7
October 2, 2019
Ina Garten’s Lemon Chicken
Ina Garten’s lemon chicken is “the best roast chicken I’ve ever made.” That’s what we’re hearing time after time from everyone who makes this roast chicken from the Barefoot Contessa herself. Tasting is believing.
Adapted from Ina Garten | Barefoot in Paris | Clarkson Potter, 2004
I’ve made Ina Garten’s lemon chicken no less than a dozen times, and each and every guest has raved. It’s also a...
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Marcella Hazan’s Bolognese Sauce
Marcella Hazan’s Bolognese sauce recipe is authentic as can be and is the absolute best Bolognese sauce recipe ever. It’s also easy and impressive.
Adapted from Marcella Hazan | Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking | Knopf, 1992
Marcella Hazan, in her inimitable fashion, offers the home cook an authentic Bolognese sauce recipe, the kind an Italian grandmother would approve of, thank you very much. This is my version of her...
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September 28, 2019
A Better Brine for Chicken
There comes a time when even the most beloved and closely held adages need to be challenged. Take Plato’s “necessity is the mother of invention.” Centuries ago, for example, long before refrigeration, people had to figure out how to preserve food for long periods, especially fallow times, and — boom — salting food, either by packing it in salt (think bacalao) or adding it to a brine (think pickles), was born. I submit that...
July 21, 2019
In a ’64 T-Bird, Chasing a Date with a Clam
Recapturing a childhood memory is nearly impossible. Chasing after it in a black 1964 Thunderbird convertible with red interior certainly helps.
The memory: lightly fried clams with big, juicy bellies, like the kind I munched on nearly every summer weekend growing up in Swansea, Mass. The car, owned by my friend Bob Pidkameny: a nod to my godfather, a local celebrity and stock car driver, who would pile my two cousins and me into whatever...
July 19, 2019
Millennials, It’s Time to Grow up
My takeout breakfast order was simple. Two eggs, sausage, and Cheddar on toasted multigrain with salt and pepper. Apparently, though, to the twenty-something behind the cash register, it proved anything but simple.
[Our 100% authenticated exchange follows]
“So, that’s one egg–,” she repeated, distracted by a conversation of her coworkers, all about her age.
“No, two eggs.”
“Right. Two eggs, sausage,...
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July 18, 2019
My Problem With Balls
I have a problem with balls. I can’t catch them, I can’t hold on to them, and I certainly can’t throw them. But apparently, balls don’t have a problem with me. They seem drawn to me. I could be walking by a playing field, a tennis court, even a neighbor’s yard, and balls of all sorts would inevitably seek me out.
This unusual Law of Attraction started the summer when I was 11 years old and played right field in the Swansea Little......
May 17, 2019
Forever and Completely
A long-term relationship has a lot in common with cleaning out a closet. Over the years, you learn what’s worth keeping and what can be tossed. In my nearly two decades with The One, we’ve often cleared the emotional and interpersonal closets of our lives, each time reshaping the sum of us. For example, I’ve come to acknowledge his Hess truck collection, which he uses as Christmas decorations, and his...
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May 11, 2019
If I Were a Mother
Originally published on May 1, 2011.
A little sage advice: Be careful what you say about yourself, because yesterday’s jest could be tomorrow’s character-defining statement.
Let me explain. Seventeen years ago, The One and I were invited for a wintry weekend in Washington, CT, long before we ever bought a home there. We were guests of our then brand-spanking-new friends, Matty and Janet R. Janet had worked with The One in real...
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March 11, 2019
Corned Beef Hash
This corned beef hash, made of potatoes, onion, butter, and corned beef, turns St. Patrick’s Day leftovers into homemade lusciousness any time of day.
Originally published March 12, 2013.
As part of his wooing ritual way back in 1994, The One lured me up to his country house, in Barryville, New York, one weekend. The blush was very much on the rose back then. It was a time when I learned something new about my inamorato almost...
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February 6, 2019
Valentine’s Day Menu 2019
Video: Valentine's Day Menu 2019
Well, it’s that time again to celebrate that most romantic of holidays, VD. And if your Valentine’s Day is anything like ours (“ours” meaning mine and The One Who Brings Me Love, Joy, and Happiness), it usually involves smooching, exchanging of cards and gifts, an argument (or three), and dinner of some sort.
But we rarely go to restaurants these days. The sight of cooing and...
